A Redbreast in a Cage
by ragabeubeu
Summary: 24 year-old Emma Swann is a student in psychology; when she decides to write a thesis about prison, she discovers a darkness that neither her fiancé nor her parents manage to quell. The deepening of her study will lead her to several encounters with the serial killer who was freshly caught, and who terrorized the State of Maine: the Driveway Ripper, AKA Killian Jones.
1. Chapter 1

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: out of character and storyline. I'm just warming up on OUAT fics, I hope you'll enjoy this one, and won't forget to leave a review if you do. Even if you don't, really. **

Summary: twenty-four-year-old Emma Swann is a student in psychology; when she decides to write a thesis about how prison alienates the mind, she discovers a darkness that neither her fiancé nor her parents manage to quell. The deepening of her study will lead her straight into the prison realm, and to several encounters with the serial killer who was freshly caught, and terrorized the State of Maine: the Driveway Ripper, AKA Killian Jones. But curiosity becomes a nightmares when the murderer escapes, and starts a long game of cat and mouse.

…

_'__If you look in the face of evil, evil's going to look right back at you' _

_American Horror Story_

At first, it was all about learning. It was about discovering. Because the third trimester was coming up, and most of her friends and acquaintances had already chosen a topic for their thesis. The deadline was coming up, and she'd picked without thinking. Prison. Why? She wouldn't be able to answer that, but why not? It seemed as relevant as anything else, and she'd at least get a decent mark for originality.

Although her teacher warned her about this, asked if she could meet him in his office. Doctor Archie Hopper had always seemed like a kind man to her, and when he greeted her before his desk, she could only see slight concern in his expression.

"Emma." He smiled, curly hair peaking out of the sides of his glasses.

"You wanted to see me, sir?"

"No need to look worried, it's nothing serious. Sit, please."

She complied, and folded her hands on her lap. Her golden hair was gathered into a smooth ponytail, and she resisted the urge to fiddle with the few strands that fell free. It wasn't as though Archie Hopper was an intimidating man, her teacher nevertheless, still she'd never felt the slightest hint of nervousness in his presence before. It was because of the thesis, she knew it before he had to say it. _That's_ what made her nervous. She knew that for certain, even though she couldn't explain why in God's name.

"I'll be honest with you, Emma." The man spoke quietly. "It's about the topic you've chosen. Alienation is a vast subject, and although I'm certain prison would be one very interesting way to treat it, I feel that I must warn you."

"Warn me?"

"Don't get me wrong, the subject is difficult to handle no matter how you put it, only I'm afraid the one you chose might be more difficult than others." He continued, serious; this was a warning, no mistakes could be made. "There'll be visits involved. I hear the mere environment is enough to change a person. If you want to write about what prison does to inmates, you'll have to meet a few."

"Sir, with all do respect –" A slight chuckle interrupted her words. "I wouldn't have chosen something I can't handle."

"I just wanted to make sure you'd thought it through."

"Thank you." She responded understandingly; she did understand.

She understood her teacher's concern, she understood he'd had to make sure she knew what she was getting into. Truth was, she hadn't thought it through; she'd thought that to study prison as an alienation of the mind would make an interesting reflection, and she'd filled the paper hurriedly in class because Neal and her and had worked late on wedding invitations. Now she'd been summoned into her teacher's office, he wanted to know whether she knew what she was doing, and she didn't. It occurred to her briefly that this was the ideal time to change her mind. This was an open window.

And without understand exactly why, she closed it shut.

"I appreciate your concern, sir," she spoke warmly, "but I'm fairly certain it won't be an issue."

"Certain?"

"Yes. I don't spook easily." She smiled, and her teacher smiled back, but there was still a light trace of worry, sparkling in his eyes.

…

"_Prison_?" Her fiancé spoke the word as though it were the first time he heard it in his life.

Emma shrugged innocently, letting her hair loose and removing her jeans before she joined him in bed. A wedding magazine was still laid on his lap, above the covers, but it seemed that the article had entirely lost his attention.

Neal and her had been childhood sweethearts, he'd been her first kiss and her date at the prom; they'd finished high school together then went their separate ways, and although many of their friends had believed it would be the end of their relationship, time had proved them wrong. She'd gone to Oxford to continue her studies while he'd stayed in Storybrooke, to ultimately become the town's mechanic. She'd come home to him every weekend and he'd be waiting for her with a sweet from the bakery, a cherry tart, because it was what she'd ordered on their first date, at Starbuck. In the meanwhile, marriage had always been the obvious turnout of their relationship, the ultimate step.

He'd proposed just a month ago, when she'd come home to him a Friday night, as always, and a diamond ring lodged in a velvety box, had been waiting for her carton box, near the cherry tart.

Emma slid in bed and switched off the nightlight on her bedside table, as though it would erase the astonishment on Neal's face.

"Well, I'm afraid my choices were a bit limited." She said for an excuse. "Seriously, what would you have picked concerning alienation?"

"I don't know, anything but something that'd imply meeting with _murderers_."

She rolled her eyes at this. "Come on, Neal."

"Can you blame me?" Though there was a bit more seriousness in his tone when he went on. "Will you at least be safe?"

"Of course. If I meet with prisoners, it'll be through bars and glass. Really, there's nothing to be worried about."

He didn't insist, but let out a reluctant sigh that was really just as bad. "Well," he muttered. "I guess if you swear to come back to me in one piece." He even managed a smile, earnest. "Seriously, honey. You sure you don't want to reconsider? I mean, interrogate cons isn't really in the top-ten advices for a bride glow."

"I'm sure." She shrugged. "Besides, it's not as though I'm signing up for life, I'll be there six weeks, top."

She said it and meant it, and yet there was something about it that came out overly pushed – untrue.

…

"Well, it's not that I don't want to help you Miss Swann, only I don't usually foster a – heated environment, when it comes to my inmates. I'm certain you understand the delicate position I'm sometimes in."

Emma paused for a second. The office seemed neither cold or hostile in any way, and yet it inexplicably made her ten times more uncomfortable than Doctor Hopper's. Ultimately, she looked back at her interlocutor, the prison warden, and echoed the single ambiguous word he'd spoken. "Heated?"

"Excuse me if I sound crude, Miss Swann, but I'm afraid you must be aware that your presence wouldn't be in favor of the calmest atmosphere."

Emma bit down on her irritation. So basically, if she were an ugly guy, they wouldn't be having this conversation.

"Look –" She was willing to throw herself into an argument if necessary, although she interrupted herself when she realized; the man still hadn't told her his name. "Sir," she settled for. "I hardly see how any of this has to do with why I came here for –"

"To write a thesis, yes. But I'm sure you understand I must take everything into consideration, this isn't quite as though we're dealing with a harmless matter."

"You're saying my presence would induce a more hostile environment?" That would be rich, she thought, when dealing with a prison.

The warden smiled; it was forced, and visibly annoyed, yet at the same time, intrigued. "What I'm saying Miss Swann, is that if you bring fresh meat at the zoo and wave it in front of the cage, the animals will bite."

"Animals?" She echoed, half-amused and more startled than actually outraged. "Are you sure it's an appropriate metaphor?"

The man's smile enlarged. Suddenly, Emma wasn't at all in the mood to laugh anymore. There was something _gruesome_ about that smile.

"I'll tell you what." He said calmly, as though the surprise in her last remark had genuinely made her more amusing than irritating to his eyes. "I'll agree to your request, I'll let you write your essay. You'll need to follow my rules thoroughly, and I'll let you meet with one of the inmates for the following six weeks." He still hadn't dropped the grin, but sounded as serious as can be. "And then, Miss Swann, you can tell me whether the metaphor was appropriate or not."

…

Her heels clicked like metal against the cement ground, and as she entered the lugubrious corridor, it seemed that every ounce of bravery she owned had crawled to hide in the pit of her stomach. The place was vast, and yet it felt narrow; there was something frighteningly symmetric about it, staircases and steel-grey doors, almost as though she'd stepped right inside of a mirror.

She walked fast, following the prison warden, and the further she got, the more she began to understand what Doctor Archie Hopper had meant, when he'd spoken of places so macabre they change you. There was something about walking in this place that felt like walking underwater. It felt _exactly_ like walking underwater.

For twenty four years, she had lived peacefully and had never imagined that anything in this world could be so dark.

It was like spending years looking at the ocean, but never seeing below the surface. You've always known what was there, but you've never really looked. It felt like an epiphany. Like falling into the other side of the mirror; the bottom of the sea. It looked quiet from up there, but from below, you can see all the things that are forgotten; the wreckage, seaweed and rocks, and it's the same world, they look almost the same as they do up above. Only they're slightly, and undeniably darker.

The world was filled with sharks and fish, and Emma Swann wasn't certain what role she could play on this setting.

"You'll meet the prisoner through glass." The warden spoke calmly. "He will be restrained. If there are files you wish for him to fill, remove all trombones or pins from the pages, give him nothing but soft paper."

"Yes."

"The man I've chosen is someone who has only recently been apprehended. Someone I'm sure you've heard of. The sentence is life in prison, so you'll have plenty of time to ponder what these walls do to his brain."

Emma wasn't certain she was meant to answer that, and she didn't have much time to think it through before the warden abruptly stopped walking. She did too, reflexively; her feet felt sore, and if she'd thought this through she wouldn't have chosen high heels this morning. Again, she didn't have time to ponder on it because the man looked at her and smiled, and it froze her still. His smile was like an ice cube creeping down her spine.

"He's a murderer." He specified. "But this won't bother you, will it Miss Swann? You could even ask him where he's hidden his victims, I'm afraid even the police failed to get an answer to that."

Emma was uncertain whether he was trying to intimidate her or naturally frightening, but she wondered for a second if this place got scarier.

"Anything I failed to mention?" He asked, and it took a second for Emma to answer.

"Your name?"

He smiled once more. "Adam. But to you, Miss Swann, it'll be Mr. Gold."

…

She waited a moment, sitting on an iron chair, for them to bring the prisoner. A thick glass separated her from the yet empty seat, where they would lead the man. He didn't have a face yet, but in her mind, he did; the face of true evil. There was something _wrong_ about this place, something deeply unwell, and yet as Emma Swann realized her hands were slightly shaking, she acknowledged it wasn't just from fear. There was excitement; thrill. Because she had spent all her life on the bright side of the world, and it had never occurred to her before now to take a look and discover what was underneath.

It wasn't too late, she thought, she could still back down. Mr. Gold would smirk no doubt, and indulge himself in the thought that his Prison wasn't a place for decent girls, but she wouldn't have to stand the sight of his smile for very long, and Doctor Hopper would understand.

But Emma was frozen in her seat.

Because terror has that effect; because the darkness was such it would have made anyone curious; because she wasn't certain she could ever look at the sunny right world again. Because she felt she needed to take a real look at the darkness before she could step back into the light.

And then, they brought him in.

Two guards were there to drag him inside the seat, although he showed no sign of struggle. There was viciousness in his smile, manacles on his hands and feet, and such darkness in the look he gave her that his eyes appeared pitch black.

The guards left them after securing him to the iron seat, and for a long moment both remained silent, alone. Emma was aware she should be the one asking questions, she should introduce herself, but something jammed her throat. Recognition. The man was Killian Jones. He was the Driveway Ripper. She'd followed his crimes on television, feared with the rest of the village when the police had established a curfew, and had felt relieved at the news of his arrest.

She was staring at the Master of the Sea. The King of the underworld.

Shadow seemed to gather in the center of his eyes, and despite the grotesque prison-blue of his uniform, despite the bars building his cage and the glass between them, he didn't look at all like the prisoner of them both; in fact, he looked knowing. There was something about this ruthless smile that indicated he knew. It would be irrational and illogical to think it, but it appeared to Emma as clear as clear. As though he knew _her_; knew that she'd fallen through the looking glass, and knew that he was the darkest thing she'd ever seen.

There was something about his smile that breathed: _initiation_.

"Mr. Jones." She spoke, as soon as she could gather her voice and manage not to falter. She would not allow herself to sit there wordless like an intimidated schoolgirl.

"You must be the student." His words were both burning like scorching coal and smooth as milk. It was the kind of voice that compels you to do just about anything. The kind that hardly needs strength, because it can persuade.

"Yes." She felt the need to swallow back her words; he shouldn't be the one asking questions, but she felt incapable to reverse their roles.

He was the one whose wrists and ankles were restricted, he was the one on the other side of that cage, and yet something told Emma those meetings would occur on his terms.

He paused, and looked at her. His smile was knowingly wicked but trustworthy, oddly; the kind of smile that bewitches you into letting him into your home, and into your bedroom. The sort of smile that gets you to open your door to a stranger, even when a murder-wave is going on. The kind of smile that genuinely makes you think that you'll be spared.

Killian Jones's apparent gentleness was this of a wolf that dipped its paw in flour to make it appear white.

"You're here to learn from me?" He asked.

He really shouldn't be the one asking the questions, yet Emma swallowed and repeated. "Yes."

He hesitated, and the sigh he let out only widened his smile. The kind of smile that'd make you damn your own soul. "Well, Goldilocks." He said. "Welcome to wonderland."


	2. Chapter 2

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hey, hope you'll enjoy this new chapter; anyway, don't forget to leave a review :)**

_'__He came out of the dark like he was made of it.' _

_Mary Reilly _

…

"You're sure you're okay, honey?"

Emma shortly froze at her fiancé's question, but her back was turned to him, and she could still hope he hadn't noticed. It was around six in the morning, they were both getting ready for work – at the moment, hers was more delicate than his.

She slid inside her mid-thigh beige skirt and answered as casually as she managed. "Yeah. I mean – I'm here to learn, that's all."

But there was something in her voice that must have sounded off. There was something in her voice that couldn't _not_ sound off, because she'd come home from a trip to the bottom of the sea, and she was going right back under today.

She heard Neal sigh behind her, and forced herself to turn around. "It's just yesterday, when you came back from that place, you seemed –" He hesitated shortly. "Unhinged."

"Oh?" She tried to sound surprised, but couldn't exactly hope he hadn't noticed it. Yesterday, she'd met with the ruthless murderer that had terrorized the small town of Storybrooke and the whole State of Maine; she reckoned it was enough to unhinge anyone.

"Look," he said, "I understand this assignment is important to you, so I'll just make you promise me one thing, all right?"

"What?" There was slight concern in her voice.

"If you feel this thing is getting too risky, you'll tell me and walk away."

"Risky?" She echoed the word despite herself; this much hadn't exactly occurred to her yet.

Prison was something she'd never thought of until recently, something she'd never _really_ contemplated before now; she had never really thought of it as another facet of the world, filled with people who looked just like the ones she met every day but were slightly different. Darker. A place filled with criminals, and between them and the prison warden Mr. Gold, she wasn't certain who made her the least comfortable.

Now, she discovered the darkness like a child reads a thrilling horror book for the first time, but it hadn't occurred to her to feel fear; it hadn't occurred to her that the monsters would crawl out of the pages and try to pull her in.

"You know what I mean," Neal said, and sighed once more; he was cute when he worried, Emma had to give him that. "I barely even dare to bring you to my workplace, due to the fact that my colleagues are immature horny pricks, so to think you spend your days in prison doesn't exactly fill me with joy."

She chuckled at that, then tied her hair up in a long ponytail. "Look, it's sweet that you worry, but really, there's nothing to be concerned about. These men are in prison, Neal."

"Well, suppose they're released one day."

She bit her lip for a second. "If it'll make you feel any better, the inmate I'm currently meeting with is sentenced to life in prison."

"Anyone I know?" He wondered, without true curiosity. Emma reckoned that was because he wasn't expecting for her to answer: Killian Jones.

She should have said it; truth was, she hadn't planned on lying to him, yet when she opened her mouth to speak, something stopped her. She couldn't have explained what. Maybe she merely feared it would increase her fiancé's worries. Maybe it was just that, before you mention you've met the King of the deep dark sea, you ask for permission.

"I don't think so." She ultimately answered, and finished adjusting her skirt. "Will you zip me up?"

…

"Miss Swann." Adam Gold greeted her with an eerie smile when he saw her. "You came back."

"Is that surprising?" For some reason, Emma reckoned that not much actually surprised Mr. Gold.

His smile enlarged slightly. It still chilled her to the bone. "Please, sit." He put warmth in his tone, and somehow it sounded even icier.

As Emma Swann sat in the man's office for the second time, she permanently decided that she didn't like it at all. She really shouldn't be thinking in metaphors, she felt too close to the cliché of Alice tumbling down in wonderland, but as she detailed Mr. Gold shortly, she couldn't help but think that, unlike Killian Jones, he didn't look like a king at all, not even like a master. He ruled the prison, yet wasn't exactly part of the prisoners' world.

He was the puppeteer, Emma understood despite herself, and a chill ran over her.

"So," she said to clear her head, "I was told you wanted to meet with me again?"

"Yes, actually I think there's something we ought to discuss." He paused briefly. "As I've told you yesterday, Miss Swann, it's not a habit of mine to generate any sort of excitement within the inmates, or anything that could favor a dangerous environment."

Emma wasn't exactly sure what he meant by dangerous, but she held her tongue.

"Nevertheless," he continued, "if I allowed you to write your essay, I'm certain you understand that it was because I considered we could both gain something from it."

"Excuse me?"

A grin curved up his lips. She really had to learn how to stop making him smile. "Killian Jones is without a doubt one of the most complicated patient here, I'm sure you'll figure that by yourself, a genuine mystery. I'm certain you must have guessed I haven't put you on his case randomly."

She'd had a vague idea of this, indeed. At first, she'd merely thought he'd introduced her to the face of ruthlessness itself to scare her off, but now she was starting to see deeper in his game.

"Killian Jones would never let a psychiatrist approach him," Mr. Gold went on, "which is why I thought that you might have a better chance at examining him. Without him knowing, of course."

So concretely, Emma thought, a twenty-four-year-old student in psychology, in search of information to write an exposé, was less obvious than a doctor trying to probe the mind of a freshly caught killer.

"Exactly what is it you want from me?" She asked.

"If Jones thought for a second you were here to study him specifically, he'd close up like iron gates. All I ask of you, Miss Swann, is that you write your essay, and give me a copy of every word you type."

"You want me to trick him." Despite Emma's will, the word her fiancé had spoken this morning came back to mind: _risky_.

"Well, forgive me for making such an assumption, but I thought you might be drawn to the experience. No doctor has ever yet approached Killian Jones, his mind is all yours, so to speak. Students rarely get the chance to study such a specimen, I thought you might be curious."

And she was curious. Curious because evil was there all around her, locked in a cage like huge sharks restrained in aquariums while she wandered and looked around, and all she had to do was scratch the surface to go an inch deeper into the dark. But curiosity killed the cat.

"Jones won't consider you as a threat," Mr. Gold went on. "In fact, fortunately enough, he might see you as a toy. It's easy to fool someone who thinks he's fooling you, Miss Swann."

But as Emma began to get a clearer image of Mr. Gold's character, she learned to read between the lines. And what he meant was: a pretty young girl, who looked well alike the ones Killian Jones used to kill, wouldn't be considered as a threat so much as a victim.

"So concretely," the warden went on, "I'm asking you to write your thesis. And when Jones will try to lead you off track and speak about his killings, because he will, I'm asking you to write down what he says, too."

Emma Swann remained silent, but it wasn't hesitation. There could be several reasons why she should disagree to the man's offer, even if that would mean giving up on the assignment. For starters, to play any sort of game with a serial killer sounded like walking on thin ice, but foremost, she felt as though to agree to Mr. Gold's offer would inevitably mean entering his game, too. It would mean agreeing to become a pawn in the puppeteer's show.

But the curious attraction that drew her here felt beyond her control. She didn't feel as though she'd seen enough of this so very dark world just yet to be able to go back to the real world. Because the sunny world above the surface of the deep blue sea _was_ the real world, she didn't yet doubt it.

Mr. Gold smiled once more–it was still as gruesome–before he went on. "Well, dear. Do we have a deal?"

…

Her heart was beating too fast when Killian Jones sat before her again. He was the prisoner, she had to remember this much, because the mere way he looked at her was enough to make her feel like a mouse caught in an eagle's claw.

There was something both _wrong_ and exciting about being looked at this way. There was something thrilling about watching the predator's mouth get watery, about being able to _sense_ the danger, but sit well and safe on the other side of that cage.

"Tell me, sweetheart," he spoke at some point, after casually answering her coy routine questions, in a voice so sweet and hoarse that he sounded both gentle and cruel. "Aren't you going to ask what it felt like?"

Emma swallowed, and wondered for a second whether she should pretend not to know what he meant. Ultimately, she said. "I don't have to know about the attacks."

"No." He agreed, then asserted with a certainty that made her breathing shatter. "But you want to." He detailed her with eyes both cold and aroused, with the custom of a professional and the devotion of an artist. "Aren't you going to ask me _why_?" He asked again. "Why some people become dentists, others lawyers, but I become a Ripper? Aren't going to ask me how evil brews, whether or not I had father issues or tortured puppies?"

Emma's heartbeat quickened despite herself. She remembered the deal she'd made with Mr. Gold, and yet for the umpteenth time, her brain shouted at her to back down. Because the way that Killian Jones looked at her right now gave her the impression that she'd never quite be able to tell whether she was playing or getting played, and it inexplicably felt as though to ask a question outside of the thesis she was writing would make their relationship _personal_. And this was something very, very frightening. Something her fiancé Neal would consider risky.

But she'd made a deal, and curiosity dictated her thoughts rather than wariness. After all, she was on the other side of the aquarium, she thought, and regained a bit of confidence.

"Did you?" She asked and arched a brow; she was in control of her actions, she fought with all her strengths to believe that.

His lips broke into a wide merciless grin. "No. I don't fit the profile, do I?"

Emma didn't answer. He both fitted it too much and not at all.

"I didn't have a traumatic childhood, I didn't suffer from mistreatment or abuse." He paused for a second; despite the glass separating them, his dark gaze felt _burning_ on Emma's skin. "It's not quite what you see on television, hey? Everything doesn't happen for a reason, _evil_ isn't explainable. Would you like to hear my theory?"

She swallowed. The notebook on her lap felt inexplicably heavy; she should be taking notes, not just because it was the reason why she was here initially, or because of the deal she'd made with Mr. Gold, but because it would restore the status of their conversation, which she couldn't let herself forget. But as Killian Jones spoke, she found herself incapable to move an inch, as though prisoner from her own flesh – and his eyes.

He waited until he must have taken her terrified silence for an agreement, and went on calmly. "The people you cross path with in the street, your doctor, your teacher, your pharmacist, absolutely every person on this planet… is capable of murder."

Emma's throat jammed with anxiety.

His voice was still calm, seductive, and there was a sliver of amusement in his eyes that almost looked _inviting_. Almost as though she was standing on the threshold of humanity, caught between one side brighter than the sun and another dark as coal, and Killian's gaze said: _come on in_.

Satisfaction curved a smile on his lips. "You think evil is a status, do you gorgeous? You think it's a stigma that only monsters wear tattooed on their flesh?" He leaned in an inch closer to the glass, and although gates separated them, although Killian's hands were trapped in steel bracelets, Emma's breath was caught in her throat when he moved. "Tell me, Goldilocks. Does it ever occur to you that evil is a passion?"

…

She tried to maintain her footsteps slow and controlled as she exited the prison, but when the guards were out of sight, when she could no longer feel Killian Jones's eyes burning holes in her back, once she'd gotten inside her car and locked all doors in haste, she let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.

She let her head rest against the seat cushion and waited a moment to calm down.

Her hands were shaking when she locked them around the driving wheel.

It wasn't just because of the meeting with Killian Jones, and at the same time it's all it was about. It was because, in two days only, she had discovered a world she would have never suspected to exist. It was because, ever since she'd lifted that heavy red curtain and discovered the obscure world underneath, an unconscious part of her had feared there would be no coming back to the light. A part of her had feared that it wasn't a new world she was looking at, but the same one she lived in; there was no light to come home to.

And now she feared she hadn't discovered a new universe, but lifted the veil and seen the true face of humanity, hideous and vile; and dark, dark, dark. She feared that, after removing the liar's mask, the curtain could never be brought down.


End file.
